We all know what these Free Video Streaming platforms are. YouTube of today is what TV was like a decade ago – it is the prime source of entertainment, news, and Information. But as you may have noticed, today’s YouTube was not the same as we knew it back then. There are multiple YouTube updates every year. So, what are these Updates?
Visually, not much- well, there you Did yet YouTube handles, and you Can now watch YouTube Shorts on smart TVs and Game consoles. But apart from this, not much has changed this year.
What are YouTube Updates for 2022?
At the time of this writing, four major updates for the overall YouTube platform have been made. Although we admit that unless you are from a specific region, most of these updates probably did not affect you much.
That said, if you are a content creator and are thinking about how to monetize YouTube, then these updates might have been a game changer for you. So, what are these updates?
YouTube Update 2022 – November: YouTube Shorts Expansion
In November of 2022, YouTube had an update where you can now watch Shorts on Smart TVs, Game Consoles, and other streaming devices. Once you access YouTube from your device, you can select Shorts on the Shots Shelves. Once you do this, you will get a continuous viewing experience customized for YouTube.
YouTube Update 2022 – October – User Handles and Super Thanks Expansion
October was a month of multiple updates. This month saw updates in two major areas – one of which could potentially be a game changer for the entire platform as a whole.
Super Thanks Expansion
The expansion of the Super Thanks feature has been the overall theme of the 2022 YouTube Update so far, and October updates saw another of such updates. The YouTube Team expanded Super Thanks to more than 20 new regions and nations. The month of October unlocked many region-locked audiences and income sources for your favorite creators of this free video streaming platform. This, in conjunction with the September update of Super Likes on YouTube Shorts, was an overall big upgrade for Content creators and their loyal audience.
YouTube Handles
The concept of YouTube Handles is similar to Instagram handles because they are unique identifiers of YouTube users. The term “users” here is a bit loose as it represents content creators and Viewers.
YouTube Handles update essentially makes it easier for viewers to search for their favorite creator in the massive ocean of YouTube Channels with similar names and themes. Alternatively, this 2022 YouTube Updates October also enables the content creator to easily recognize loyal viewers and interact with them on a deeper level.
YouTube Update 2022 – September – Supers Expansion and Auto Captions
Unlike June 2022, September 2022 had three major updates. Although two of these updates were additions to the “Super” features of YouTube, the third one is a pleasant surprise. These updates are:
Super Thanks on Shorts Beta
Is YouTube Shorts still on Beta? From the looks of this update, it seems to be true. Although YouTube Shorts has been running since 2022, it is still in its infancy. And as such, there are a lot of features that are still being tested on this short video content version of YouTube. Super Thanks is one such feature.
This update allows users to support their favorite creators on YouTube Shorts with Super Thanks. That said, this feature is only available for a limited number of content creators and viewers. Therefore you may still not have access to this feature as of yet. If you want to know if you have access to this Beta feature on Beta Shorts, you need to check if you have symbol beside the shorts of the YouTube content creator. So now, you can support your short video content creators while watching YouTube videos or playing videos on YouTube.
Expansion of Super Features
Indonesia is not the only country that was region locked from the Supers. Thailand and Vietnam were also locked from using the Super features, which include Super Thanks, Super Chat, and Super Stickers.
As one of the September 2022 YouTube Updates, YouTube also expanded its Super features to these two nations. This expanded a new region of potential viewers for the content creators of YouTube Live and enabled the viewers of these nations to support their favorite content creators.
The pilot of Suggested Edits on YouTube Automatic Captions
Let’s be honest here; YouTube captions are not all that accurate. The words are easily mis-captioned. Although most of these miscaptioned words sound somewhat similar to the original speech, there are times when the captioned words are worlds apart from the spoken. This severely hampers the experience of watching videos on YouTube. Therefore in September 2022, YouTube piloted a new feature where users can suggest the correct captions.
To do this, users will need to open the Transcript and clock on the edit icon. Once this is done, viewers can edit the suggestions before clicking on the tick button. These edits are only shown to the viewers and will not be kive t others users before the content moderation team thoroughly reviews them on YouTube. The overall process of suggesting a caption and being available for the rest of the viewers can take a while.
At the same time, this 2022 YouTube Update can only be accessed from a desktop and for the YouTube videos from the channels with Automatic Captions enabled. You cannot access this feature from YouTube Mobile App.
September was a month of Major Updates for YouTube for 2022.
YouTube Update 2022 – June – Super Chat and Super Stickers
The month of June was all about expanding the feature of Super Chat and Super Stickers to Indonesia. In this update, YouTube Live viewers could send Super Chat and Super Stickers to their favorite content creators.
If you are an avid viewer of YouTube Live from this nation and want to support your favorite content creator through these two means, you can do it now from Indonesia. This also means that Indonesia was previously a locked region for YouTube Content creators.
This update essentially opened up a new source of income and viewers for content creators on YouTube Live.
The Summary of the Updates
All in all, the overall updates of 2022 could be summed up into four major parts – Supers Expansion, YouTube Handles, Edit of Auto Caption, and YouTube Shorts Beta Testing. The Super feature of YouTube was expanded multiple times – which greatly benefits the content creator and viewers. It was unlocking previous region-locked sources of viewership and income for the creators and influx of new forms of videos for the users. This is further supported by Beta Testing of Super Likes on YouTube Shorts – which is now accessible from TVs, Consoles, and other smart devices.
Another large chunk of the update was the addition of YouTube Handles and the Pilot of Auto Caption Edits. These updates essentially upgrade the user experience with the subtitles and YouTube searches.
Overall, 2022 is a great year for YouTube Updates.
We hope you found this interesting and helpful. And as always, thank you for reading till the end.
FAQ
Q: What is the new update on YouTube 2022?
A: The four major updates on YouTube 2022 are:
- Super Expansion
- The pilot of YouTube Auto Caption Edit
- YouTube Handles
- YouTube Shorts Beta testing on Super Likes and Availability on smart devices
Q: Is 2022 too late for YouTube?
A: No, it is not. Although YouTube has a ton of content creators and videos, as long as you produce high-quality videos for your target audience, you can still make it big.
Q: Did YouTube recently change?
A: YouTube is constantly changing with each update, and as of late, YouTube has announced a wide range of visual tweaks and UI updates along with new features.
Q: How does YouTube pay you?
A: There is no simple answer to this, as there are multiple ways this can be done. The simple answer to this is ad sense, where YouTube takes a cut from the earnings you gain from the ads and gives you the rest. Additionally, you can also make money in other ways. If you want to know more about monetizing youtube, you should read our article “How to Get monetized on YouTube?”
Q: Which is better, YouTube shorts, Instagram Reels, or TikTok?
A: All three of these short video content platforms have their good and bad aspects, but at the time of this writing, TikTok is still in the lead.